Topic: Charity(OXFAM)

[moonbeam]

A bit shocked to say the least.
My sister in England works as a volunteer in an Oxfam shop as you can imagine plenty of clothes etc get handed in along with lots of electrical items.
Oxfam doesn't sell electrical items in there shops so she thought they would pass them on to the other charity shops who do (they don't) instead they dump them in the bin even the ones that have been handed in still in there box and never been used.
She asked the manager of the shop why they didn't pass them on the answer he gave her left her quite shocked ,so shocked that she walked out and is now doing volunteer work for another charity shop who does pass items on that are very good but are not sold in there shops.
His answer by the way was its not our policy to help other charity shops.
I know which charity shops i will be giving a wide berth from now on.
I don't know why they don't put a notice up in all of there charity shops saying they don't take electrical items instead of taking them in and then duping them in the bin.

[supersprout]

Yes, that's poor practice >:( I wonder if that's central policy or just one bad apple? Good on your sis for voting with her feet moonbeam :)

[Garden Gnome]

I hope it's one bad apple!

I work at Oxfam as a volunteer, and anything electrical gets passed to another Oxfam branch that specialises in electricals, where it's checked and sold.

Things like spectacles: I have worked at Cancer Research, too, and if people come in with their old specs, then we (as we in Oxfam do) accept them with gratitude and pop them along to the specs collection at a local optician's so someone in another land can benefit from them. There's a lot more interaction in the two towns where I've worked in charity shops than would appear! Especially in pointing out the shoplifters to each other: YOU try and remind people who exactly is the charity !

[Robert_Brenchley]

Our church charity shop gets all sorts of stuff, but very little of it's electrical these days; most people realise there are far more restrictions invoved than we could cope with. Oxfam will have far more resources; we run strictly on volunteers; if we don't let it grow to the point where we'd need to raise funding to pay a worker, then we can't have a crisis when we lose the funding, or any of the many other problems which can come up. Clothes we can't use (and a good deal of what we get isn't fit for a dog's bedding, let's face it) go for recycling; anything else we can't use will eventually end up on a skip since there's nothing else we can do with a lot of it.

[greyhound]

Earlier this year I took some items to an Oxfam, just bric a brac: framed prints, ornaments and the like.  I was able to park outside the shop, and I went inside first, as it would have been a bit awkward to manage the door and the box at the same time.

Me:  I’ve been having a bit of a clear-out, and I’ve brought a few things you might be able to sell.
Sour-faced Volunteer:  We don’t take electrical goods.
Me:  There aren’t any electrical goods.
SFV:  We don’t take large items of furniture.
Me (looking outside for signs of removal van):  I haven’t brought any furniture.
SFV:  Well ….what sort of things is it, then?
Me:  Well, if you hold the door open for me, I can bring them in and you can have a look.

Once inside, two more SFVs emerged from an inner sanctum, and all three turned their backs on me and descended on the box like vultures.  Not one of them spoke to me again. 

I didn’t expect effusive thanks and gratitude (I was only getting rid of stuff I didn’t want, after all)  but a simple “thank you” and some civility was surely not much to ask. 

[Garden Gnome]

Yes, people's generosity is both warming and overwhelming, as is people's meanness: good point about things not being fit for a dog's bedding. In all the sorting I've done over the years, there's an abundance of unwashed underwear, socks with holes, dirty tights with ladders, filthy shoes, soiled, split bedlinen, deep-fryers still with fat in 'em, used s*x toys carefully put in, say, a hair-straightener box so always remember to unpack everything COMPLETELY. Charities can be a sort of 'tip in the town.'

Then someone comes in with a box of brand-new clothes, still with price tags on from Monsoon ('I never got round to wearing them.') and a lovely piece of china we can sell. That is SO heart-warming.

In the different shops I've worked, we reckon that for every binbag donated, there is on average one saleable item. Tragic, eh? And the price of our rubbish being collected has gone up hundreds of per cent the last few years, so it costs dearly for the shop to throw it away.

[Garden Gnome]

greyhound, that's DREADFUL!

A simple, heart-felt thank you is so easy! And without your kindness and effort, there wouldn't be charity shops!

[greyhound]

On the subject of dog bedding, some years ago I went into a charity shop (not Oxfam) looking for some blankets for the dogs to lie on in the car.  They often have more of this kind of thing in the back room where things are sorted, so I asked if they had any blankets (without going into details about why I wanted them).  The very posh lady volunteer snapped, “Not for dogs!  Not for dogs!”

I’m afraid I was so taken aback that I didn’t raise any of the points I should have.  “I don’t have a dog,”  I lied lamely.

Suffice to say that “Not for dogs!” has been a catchphrase in our house from that day to this! 

[cornykev]

Good for sis Moonbeam I know where I would have stuck the electric straighteners and Greyhound they must have made you barking mad.   ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D

[lorna]

Lorna (jnr) is manager of a Sue Ryder shop. She is not allowed to sell electricals but they are passed on to another branch who have the means of testing and putting a "pass" ticket on.
Really sorry that people sometimes get such rudeness, just spoils it for the volunteers and managers. As Lorna always tells people without volunteers the charity shops could not operate.
Yes she does get quite a lot if items which have to go in the "rag" bags but even these create an income for the shop as they have someone collecting these bags weekly and pay for them.
Just so annoying that staff/volunteers can be so rude when people take the trouble to give things to charity shops.
Lorna

[mc55]

I give lots of stuff to various charities and the last shop was delighted to receive my 2 bags of donations.  I do often wonder why councils don't make the space outside a charity shop into a 10 mins waiting / loading space to make it easier to call in with donations.

[manicscousers]

we have a charity, Emmaus, we support, they take electrical and just about everything else, they fix things up and sell them cheaply, they take in homeless people and help them , more details by googling, we support the one in bolton and brighton, when we're visiting our son and daughter in law , very worthwhile  :)

[kt.]

I stopped giving to most charities after I learned that up to 40% of what they get is used in bureaucracy prior to going where I thought it was intended for. Now I only give to the Army Benevolent fund & Salvation Army & British Legion.